Thankful Trees and Thanksgiving Memories

As Daisy is gets older, my desire to create holiday traditions with her grows.   I have so many fond memories of making Christmas count down chains, setting up Nativity sets, creating advent calendars, teddy bear cookies, thankful thoughts in a jar etc. with my Mom. 
  

 This year I made a thankful tree with scrap book paper that I had lying around and I taped it up on a bare wall in our dining room.  I cut out dozens of colorful leaves and kept them on the table all November long.  Each morning Daisy sat on my lap (by her choice) at the dining room table and I wrote what we were thankful for on two leaves and then she got to stick both of our leaves on the tree.  She loved sticking the tape on the leaf and then smacking the leaf on the wall with her fist...lovely.  She is three after all.  What I especially loved about this daily ritual was hearing all of the adorable things that she came up with..."Thankful for baby Jesus because he was so cute.  Thankful for Minnie because she is my friend.  Thankful for pencils because I like them.  Thankful for God because he is with Jesus.  Thankful for Disney because the princesses live there.  Thankful for Vince (her neighbor friend) because he is my husband...(LOL)"  And so on.  I LOVED starting each day off doing this activity with my daughter and focusing our hearts and minds on thankfulness.  After she scurried off to watch her morning show, I would continue to sit at the table and read my Jesus Calling Devotional, while sipping my coffee and have a quick moment alone in prayer.  It was such a peaceful routine (and fun!) and that peace carried me through each day.  So thankful.

As I am writing this post, Christmas is rapidly approaching.  Now more than ever, amidst all the craziness and business I want to remember how powerful it is to start each day off in praise and thanksgiving.  I sat in a sunbeam in my living room this morning (I'm like a cat or a dog that way) and made a point to tune out the ridiculous to do list, all the presents that still need to be purchased, all the parties that we need to attend, late nights ahead, lack of sleep, all the baked goodies to be made, all the errands to run, packages to mail, extra phone calls to be made and so on.  I breathed in gratitude and exhaled praises.  Thank you Jesus that I already have all that I need.  Thank you Jesus that we have food and shelter.  Thank you Jesus that I am warm on such a chilly morning.  Thank you Jesus for loving me today and giving me peace in the midst of the hustle and bustle.  Focus my heart on what really matters this holiday season.  Focus my eyes on all that I have and not what I think I need.  I have you.  I have all that I need.  Thank you Jesus.  It's rather miraculous that a few minutes of giving thanks and praising can turn an entire day around. 

I took these pictures below right before we took the Thankful tree down at the beginning of December.  Daisy asked if she could be in the pictures and she brought her hot chocolate along.  Her expression had me busting up.  There is never a dull moment when this girl is around! 

she totally jumped in my shot...little stinker.  But honestly, it's much cuter with her hot chocolate face in there right:).

We had the special treat of having Uncle Jeremy, (my brother-in-law,) in town during Thanksgiving break.   He lives out in California and we see him once or twice a year usually.  Daisy went through a good three year long phase of being very wary of any man besides her Daddy.  But, it appears that she has finally turned a new leaf because she was all about her Uncle Jeremy this visit.  She wanted him to hold her non-stop and she asked him to do everything with her.  He bought her a Snow White ornament which she pretty much carried around for 3 days non-stop  She was pretty happy as you can tell.  

 We also dragged Jeremy out to Christmas tree hunt with us.  We went to 3 different places and we kept striking out.  We finally went back home treeless and took a lunch break.  Jeremy was a trooper and helped to entertain Daisy which was awesome. It's always such a treat to have extra set of helping hands around to keep our lively girl entertained.  It's always hard to see family go but, we look forward to seeing Uncle Jeremy again early next year when he flies back out to welcome his second niece who is due late January.  We are all very excited to meet Avery!

One of my favorite traditions is getting together with our good friends, The Morris Bunch, on Thanksgiving.  I think we have spent about 5 Thanksgivings together now and it's been such a blessing to have friends on the East coast that we can spend a special holiday with.  We met the Morris family about 10 years ago when we lived in California.  We were all newlyweds and we all attended the same church.  It was a fun life season.  The military brought them to the East Coast and our family moved this way to buy a home and settle down.  We are a few hours apart but, we've been able to get together a few times a year and they are always good times.  I love watching their kiddos grow up and Daisy has so much fun playing with their three boys now.  I am so thankful for good friends.  The kind that you can roll out of bed in jammies and bed hair and feel comfortable around.  The kind that you can have deep talks about life, marriage, family, faith and God and no one gets ruffled or takes anything too seriously.  The kind that have seen you at your best and your very worst over many years and have loved you through it all.  

Yes, so thankful for good friends and I know that Daisy loves the extra attention she gets from three charming boys.  

The kids took turns playing a game or two on the ipad with Mike. 

I made Elissa do all the cooking...because let's face it, she actually enjoys cooking. I wasn't completely useless. I took pictures of her slaving away. And I am kidding, sort of. I did make the mashed potatoes and popped the lids off the sparkling cider. Elissa came up with this amazing brine mixture and then the brine bag basically ruptured and all the liquid spilled everywhere. Not fun (though it was hard not to giggle at all the commotion from the sidelines...eek) BUT, the turkey still turned out delicious and moist! Yeah! That was pretty much our only hiccup over the Thanksgiving holiday so I'm not complaining:).

I like to stick the kids at a separate table in hopes that the adults might get more than two words of conversation in without being interrupted. I even covered the kiddie table with paper and set out stickers and crayons to keep the kids distracted and allow for a longer and more enjoyable meal time experience. The kids did awesome. The meal was delicious. The company was perfect.  Score!

Elissa tried out a new sweet potato recipe and it was SO SO good.  Definitely a new fave of mine. She also did a fresh green bean casserole and OMG so much flavor and so much healthier!! I really would like Elissa to be the permanent Thanksgiving chef going forward. :)  Thoughts, Elissa?

Might I direct your eyes to the marshmallow fruit salad up front on the plate below.  That was one of my Grandma's recipes and I spent probably 20+ Thanksgivings at her house eating that delicious salad.  It will forever be a staple in our Thanksgiving dinner as well.  Preparing it, looking at it and eating it all made me feel a little closer to her this year and I really needed that.  It's only been a little over a year since she passed and the holidays are especially hard because my life is saturated with her wonderful traditions.  I still haven't quite figured out how to move on without her presence and her at the center of the traditions.  It's hard to make a new norm when the old was so familiar and such a huge part of my life but, somehow we just press on, one day at a time.  But, oh how I miss you to the moon and back Gram.

And though it looks like we are miserable...with the exception of Elissa...:) I promise you that I was simply concentrating on how delicious the food was that I was stuffing in my mouth mid photo op.  I definitely killed the Norman Rockwell vibe that we could have created in this shot but, Elissa is on it!  hehe  The food was SO GOOD. I ate a lot, lot.

Happy. Happy.  And on that note, If I recall, we watched several episodes of Duck Dynasty together after the kiddos went to bed.  It was a great Thanksgiving!

Catching Up

So, I think I've decided that one of my new year's resolutions will be to try and get one blog post up a week and since I tend to "break" resolutions by about mid-February...I thought I should start now so that I might get a couple of extra weeks in. lol.    

I seldom make resolutions at the start of the new year but, I do enjoy the fresh perspective that a brand new year gives me and it often motivates me to take a little more action in the areas of my life that I had been neglecting.  Do you like to make new year's resolutions? 

On that note, I am going back in time just a wee bit because if I don't post these priceless images now they will soon fade away in the land of digital file space. 

Daisy wanted to be Belle for Halloween.  She has been a princess every day for the past 2.5 years and then some and I mean that she literally dresses up like a princess almost everyday.  Soooo...I was a little bummed that I couldn't convince her to be Supergirl or Shirley Temple or ANYTHING besides a princess again.  I kept my opinion to myself and made my 3 year old's dreams come true by sprinkling her hair with sparkles and dusting her cheeks with blush.  She was the sweetest princess in the land.  We went to a trunk or treat at my friend's church a week before Halloween and she had a blast!!

A few days later I happened upon a Minnie Mouse costume at a consignment shop.  It was her size and I just couldn't pass it up.  I showed it to Daisy and she said, "it's princess Minnie's dress!"  For that reason alone, she was willing to wear it and I didn't bother to explain to her that Minnie is in fact not a princess.  This way we both win. 

This year we went out a little later to trick or treat.  I think we got out close to 7 and stayed out until close to 9. We had our traditional Martinez/Bailey burritos before hand with Granddad and Beej (Daisy's great grandparents) and then Granddad passed out candy and the rest of us headed out. We treated with a group of neighbors and it was so fun to watch the kiddos go door to door together.  My little girl is getting so much more independent and well, she's growing up. tear. tear. 

 Look how small my baby girl and her friend look sitting up front together.  Sometimes they seem so big until you see them from far away and then you are reminded that they are still so little...I need those reminders from time to time:)

You can't tell by looking at her facial expression but, Daisy really enjoyed the puppet show.  It was her very first puppet show as a matter a fact.  The church did such a great job creating a fun, family friendly Halloween even for the community. 

 this is a terrible night shot on my phone but, I had to post it because it's the only one we got of our neighborhood crew before we set off on our trick or treat adventure.  

We got done trick or' treating around 9 and I put Daisy to bed shortly after.  She couldn't wait to dump all the contents of her bucket out first thing in the morning.  She immediately organized (yes she loves to organize just like her Mommy) the candies and picked her favorites.  Lolipops are always a top fave and her chocolate bars went really quick too.  This kiddo loves chocolate and she didn't get that from me:).

Fall on the east coast is gorgeous.  Growing up in Southern California we didn't experience much change in seasons.  Even after living on the East coast for six years the gorgeous fall colors never cease to take my breath away.  This pretty red leaf came off of the tree in our front yard.  SO red and lovely.

 Daddy and Daisy carved pumpkins together.  I was glad to take a year off.  Carving pumpkins is fun and all but, it's a lot of work and if I recall my hand felt like it was going to fall off after three hours of sawing pumpkins, with a tiny toothbrush sized saw last year.  It was nice to stay inside where it was warm and take pictures while sipping coffee this year. hehe.   

Last year Daisy was not impressed with the goop inside a pumpkin.  This year she was all about it.  I was so proud:).

I have to say that I was really impressed with my hub's pumpkin carvings this year and I thought it was really sweet that he carved the pumpkins with Ariel and Minnie Mouse just to make his little girl happy.  What a Dad:)  See for yourself. Pretty impressive huh.

And She loved throwing leaves around this year.  

 

I got to visit her at her fall school party.  She was so happy to have me there and it melted me to see my little girl in her class acting so big.

she was pretty tuckered out after her party as you can tell:).  Kids look so angelic when they sleep doncha think.  Lately I've been letting Daisy take her nap in my bed to make it more worth her while and more often than not I take a little nap with her and then quietly sneak out when she has fallen asleep.  She may be almost four years old but, she still looks like my little baby when she is napping:).

Now off I go to watch Walking Dead, sip tea, snuggle under a blanket, and work on my photography website.  Good night all. 

Should Young Women Get Mammograms?

 About a month ago I unexpectedly discovered that I had a lump in my right breast.

{Don't freak out...no, I do not have breast cancer...but, this discovery was a great wake up call.} 

 {Side note: Even though I am more than happy to be an open book regarding my life...there is something about writing the word breast on my public blog that makes the prude in me squirm. I know..I'm ridiculous. I didn't realize that any topic in writing was outside of my comfort zone but, evidently I have discovered it.  How odd.

I digress, because I am young(er), it has never really crossed my mind to have a routine breast exam (or ever for that matter) and I certainly wasn't expecting to schedule a Mammogram appointment during my 30th year of life.  I am so thankful that the discovery was made at all.  That in itself was a bit of a miracle.  Perhaps God was giving me a nudge to take my health a little more seriously going forward.  

Due to the fact that breast cancer does run in my family, I immediately felt a mixture of emotions upon making the discovery.  I am not a very reactive person and I am not one to "freak out," but, I sat quietly on the couch and tried to process the information and prayed about what to do next.  I felt a little nervous, anxious and overwhelmed  about the unknowns and yet at the same time I could feel God's peace and His presence.  

I talked with my Mom and texted a few friends and asked for prayer and then I quickly scheduled an appointment for a Mammogram after being prompted to do so. I may very well have ignored the situation for a while had I not been urged otherwise.

I was so impressed and thankful that they were able to schedule me in later that same day.  This gave me very little time to over think the situation. 

I was told that Mammograms can be a bit uncomfortable, so I was prepared for that possibility but, it really wasn't too terrible.  Uncomfortable yes, but bearable. More than anything I felt awkward about having my bare chest smashed between two x-ray plates in front of a technician.  I have been known to say awkward things in awkward situations.  Unfortunately, Mammogram day was one of those days for me.  To be honest, I'm a bit too embarrassed to repeat here on this blog what I said there, though I am giggling to myself at the mere thought of it. hehehe  Sometimes I remind myself of Chandler from Friends and I am not proud of that fact...'nuff said.

I was told on more than one occasion by the nurse staff, "you are so young.  We hardly ever see women your age in here."  I thought about that.  I suppose that is a good thing.  The last thing I wanted to hear them say was that the offices were booming with 30 year old women coming in to have suspicious lumps checked out.  Praise God.  Yes, that is a great thing!  Then I wondered, wait, why am I here?  Please just tell me that the lump is nothing and I will be on my merry way.  

 

As it turned out, I had not one but, three lumps in my right breast.  The fantastic news is that the lumps were cysts, no surgical removal was required and I was given the all clear sign.  I exhaled a tremendous sigh of relief and quietly squealed, "thank you Jesus."  As I said before, I am not a very reactive person but, if you could have seen the me inside of me, I was jumping up and down for joy and running around wildly screaming praises.  Can any of you relate to that or is it just me?  

I was strongly urged to take all breast lumps seriously going forward and I was advised to get Mammograms regularly to monitor things.  I took this advise to heart and I plan to be much more proactive going forward. 

I wrote this (very out of my comfort zone) post simply to encourage young women and all women for that matter, to check for lumps on a regular basis, or make an appointment yearly for an exam and then to immediately make an appointment to get a Mammogram if anything suspicious is found.  Even if you are unsure, make an appointment to put your mind at ease.

Initially when I discovered the lump, I doubted myself and I figured it was nothing.  I didn't even know what a lump was supposed to feel like.  I actually waited several days before telling anyone about it because, I didn't want seem like I was being "dramatic."  I am so thankful that I finally decided to address the situation because it was in fact a lump and it could have been cancer.  

So, if anyone has been putting off making an appointment to get a Mammogram (even if you are young(er) like me), I hope this post will give you the nudge you needed to do so.  Get er' done, please.

Breast cancer is a very, very serious thing and I will tell you that just the mere thought of having breast cancer for one day rattled me tremendously.  It was a huge wake up call and once again it challenged me to remember just how precious and beautiful life is.  It reminded me that every day is a gift and not to be taken for granted.   

Much love to all breast cancer survivors, to all who have battled it in the past or are currently battling it.  God Bless each of you today. 

Thankful

I just dropped my kiddo off at preschool and she didn't even look back to say goodbye.  It's a good thing that I'm not terribly sensitive! lol  I'm just so thankful that she is loving her school experience.

I can't believe that we are already a week into November and that the holidays are upon us once again.  I also can't believe that my little girl will be four years old in just a few short months. I guess I will never get used to the fact that time goes by much faster than I'd like but, I am so thankful for every day that I get to be alive and soak up this wild life.   

I'm thankful for sunshine, warm fires on chilly nights, coffee in the morning, unexpected phone calls and text messages from friends and loved ones (thanks Anna:)!, Pandora...free music is awesome!, Uggs-the best invention ever, my Jesus Calling daily devotional - seriously amazing, the cheery bright green chairs in my living room that I am currently staring at -happiness, my glasses - it's nice to be able to see clearly, my home -it's so cozy!, my health - arms to hug my loved ones and legs to run and greet them, my neighbors - they are all  freaking awesome, Netflixs - cuz we use it UH-LOT, my camera - the memories it allows me to capture are priceless, my husband - he works so hard for our family, my daughter - she is such a happy kid -such a ray of sunshine, my laptop - so I can sit here like a lazy sloth on the couch instead of at a desk, being able to hear - the laughter of my little girl and the sweet melodies of worship...okay, I will stop there for now...so hard to stop!

What are you thankful for today? 

I hope that you all have a blessed November. xo

I'm sure you already knew this but, Daisy adores her Daddy. They have a special bond. A silly one.  She is more wild with him.  They wrestle, they fish, they play corn hole, they smash faces, they tickle...it's funny to watch the two of them.  I'm very thankful that my little girl has a great relationship with her Daddy.  I can tell that these two will always be buddies. 

A photographer's view...also, a mom's view.  Daisy has super wavy, fine hair and it still has a slight strawberry tint to it.  So pretty. Oh hey, see my blue TOMS...I'm thankful for the friend who gave them to me:)...you know who you are.  I had never owed a pair before and now I'm hooked and trendy like the rest of 'Merica.  Yeah!

She's laughing...just in case you weren't sure and she is loving it:). She is quite ticklish unlike her Momma.  I'm thankful that I am not (really) ticklish...it's like having a super power to remain calm in the midst of a tickle.  It might come in handy some day...you never know!

And here we are singing her favorite song, Overcomer by Mandisa. We created hand motions that we do together and she asks us to sing it over and over and over again. It's a great song so I don't mind. I hope she always holds tightly to the truth.  She will always be an over-comer with Jesus in her heart!  I am thankful that my little girl gets so excited when we talk about Jesus!

and then came the best part...feeding the ducks and geese. We came with an entire loaf of bread and left with nothing. Fat, thankful ducks. Happy Daisy.

Sometimes I like to stand back and observe my family from afar and get a different perspective.  It's sweet to see the two of them enjoying a moment together in the great outdoors.  Life is beautiful.